The recent article in the Sun-News, “Border bristles at talk of new wall,” by Rick Jervis of USA Today, presents an irrational and biased perspective. It states that the current 18 foot wall is ineffective because interlopers smuggling drugs can easily climb over the wall with ladders or tunnel under it. The article then claims it has broken up the continuity and goodwill between Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Mexico.

The comparison of an 18 foot ineffective fence to the proposed 40 foot wall is completely illogical, because scaling a 40 foot wall with ladders would be a formidable task. Also, if Mr. Jervis had made the effort to do a little research, he would know that there exists the technology to detect tunneling. For example, SureWave Technology’s Tunneling Alert System can detect tunneling at depths to 1,000 feet and surface distances of 1,500 feet. These systems are passive, undetectable and have the capability to transmit to a command and control center. They can also connect to cameras or other security/alarm devices.

The influx of illegal drugs and immigrants are detrimental to the United States and must be stopped. Many thousands of Americans are dying in record numbers directly from overdose of these illicit drugs. These numbers, while high, are deceptive in that they don’t include deaths from driving under the influence, or the murders related to the drug trade.

The biggest problem with illegal immigrants is that we currently have zero control over who is entering the country. They could be terrorists, criminals, drug mules or other undesirables. We simply don’t know, and common sense says we should know exactly who they are.

The concern over continuity and goodwill with Mexico is minuscule compared to the problems we have encountered due to our unsecured borders.

Barack Obama, it is now agreed, was born in the United States and thereby became a natural-born American citizen.

His father, who was born in Kenya, was first a citizen of the United Kingdom Colonies, later of Kenya. This gave Obama citizenship in Kenya, and he did have dual citizenship — until he turned 23, when he lost his Kenyan citizenship. The Kenyan constitution does not permit dual citizenship, but gives anyone with citizenship in another country until age 23 to make a decision as to which country’s citizenship will be renounced.

The dual citizenship canard has been bouncing around in right-wing, anti-Obama circles and is clearly a mutation of the birther myth.